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Advertising Workflows and Audience Measurement

Tuesday, May 2, 2017

The advertising industry is always changing and adapting to new technology, and today’s consumers can be connected to several types of media at any given time. As technology advances, it is important that the advertising industry begin to standardize ad workflows to allow for more accurate audience measurement. At the Media & Entertainment Services Alliance Smart Content Summit East, held February 23 in New York City, a panel of knowledgeable professionals got together to discuss the issue:

Alanna Gombert: General Manager at IAB Tech Lab and VP, Technology and Ad Operations at the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB)George Ivie: CEO of and Executive Director at Media Rating CouncilChris Pizzurro: Head of Business Development, Sales, and Marketing at Canoe Ventures

Moderator:Harold Geller: Executive Director at Ad-ID

The focus of the 30-minute panel was the idea that standardization in the advertising industry happens in layers. The first layer is content identification, the second is transactional, and the third is certification. A few panelists referenced asset identification as one key element throughout these layers. George Ivie noted, “Emerging in a hugely prominent way is asset identification and building it into the transaction stream.” He also said that asset identification is needed “to identify the content as it crosses through all the different ways consumers acquire it. You have to have that to identify the content, process the content, and de-duplicate the media behavior.”

Regarding the transactional layer, Alanna Gombert talked about how VAST 4.0, a specific framework for delivery, includes a supply chain protocol which incorporates asset identification (Ad-ID), principal IDs, and intermediary IDs, so you can be sure the audience measurements are accurate and for your specific ad. Gombert also talked about the new compliance program, which will allow companies to become certified in VAST. It has been a slow adoption process, but she confirmed that there are approximately 40 companies in the pipeline, and she is hopeful that as companies discover the benefits of upgrading to VAST 4.0, more will adopt the new standards. Overall, the panel agreed that asset identification is an important part of the ad workflow and is necessary to obtain accurate audience measurement.